Wonderkid

by Wesley Stace

  None of us had a cellphone; so we kept up with Blake via the television. Whenever we stopped, we threw in a random call to his lawyer, to keep the man on his toes. It was therefore horrible news, and a complete surprise to me, when we heard on CNN that “compromising material” including “pornography” had been found in the impounded bus. It fit the bill perfectly—drugs, crazy man, too close to the children, temptation—but there was not an ounce of truth in any of the grimmer of the associations, as the police finally—and belatedly—confirmed. It wasn’t even primarily the contents of that fucking box: though they were nothing to be proud of.

  The contents were Jack’s, of course, a fairly comprehensive video library of his sexual encounters since his arrival in America. His particular predilection, what he liked to film, we all now knew, was women’s faces. He hardly ever filmed them entirely naked, though there was a bit of everything in there, but thankfully none of the “rough stuff,” all neatly labeled: Laura, Annie, Katherine, and occasionally, Mrs. Stanley, or one that just said “Kelly’s Mom.” Some touring musicians keep a box of Polaroids or a discreetly named iPhoto folder. Jack had videos of women’s faces while they were having orgasms. That’s what he filmed and what he liked. Beautiful? Sick? I think we know how he met his subjects, but had I too met them backstage? I assume he watched this collection over and over again—was that what he was doing peering into his viewfinder on the bus?—but fetishes are funny things; perhaps he never watched them. Perhaps the videos just sat there in his suitcase searing a hole in his memory. Perhaps he showed them to other women. I honestly don’t know. But Blake knew. I wish I had managed to get that box off the bus, if only so I could have handed each video back to its star with an apology, and perhaps advised them not to do it again.

  The bigger problem was Blake’s library. All those secondhand art books he kept back there: Robert Mapplethorpe, Lewis Carroll photographs, Andres Serrano, Charles Gatewood, some strange arty nudist books of kids gamboling outside quite happily in the heather. I’d seen them all and hadn’t thought a thing about it. Except for one specific image. There was a paperback art book called Temptation, a very seventies artifact, full of paintings illustrating the subject from Bosch onwards. One by Delvaux, called The Visit from 1939, showed a young naked boy with a small limp penis, walking into a room in which a naked older woman, seated, waits for him. She is cupping her breasts, looking directly at his cock. It’s one of the most arousing and disturbing images I’ve ever seen; you feel like you could get into trouble just by looking at it. Blake liked some weird stuff, sure, but possession of controversial photos and paintings isn’t a crime, unless they’re illegal. And none of them were. The most dubious stuff Blake possessed was some Victorian images of childhood. But all those kids were clothed, and they were in nice paintings, so those weren’t even discussed.

  The books and the videos added up to a nice little story. America likes a tale of redemption, but two and two makes four; you float this kind of suspicion, and all bets are off. Nothing ever made it to court, of course; it was just mentioned. I’ll admit that I’ve removed the accusation from the Wikipedia page myself on a couple of occasions. Blake loved kids. He was Jarvis Cocker protecting the kids from the weirdo; he wasn’t Michael Jackson.

  “Life, As It Is Lived” had been climbing the charts: it would have been number one, for sure, but the record company, under massive pressure from MOMs, pulled the plug. Norm couldn’t give a damn. There’d be another one round the corner. The thing is, if Blake had handed over those lyrics willingly, Norm probably would have taken the Wonderkids’ case all the way to the Supreme Court in the name of freedom of speech and the interest of publicity. As it was, he probably just muttered “Oh, please. I don’t want to hear any more about ’em” down a phone line, and that was that. He was the only person Blake never endowed with a nickname. He was always just Norm.

  Blake was granted bail—generous, since he’d just violated the terms of his previous bail—and even allowed to leave the state, though in truth there was no reason for him to be out. There were no more shows. It was just nice to have him back.

  “Hello ladies,” he said as he entered, sniffing Heaven’s air. “Nice in here. Only girls can keep a bus this clean.”

  He sat down. “Okay. Bonnie and Clyde time? Leg it back to England?” We both looked at him. “Randy? California!”

  “Yessir!” said Randy. At last, a destination.

  Blake put on a brave face, but a lot of the zip was missing. Jack could never be relied upon (besides, the word was out on him and he was lying low, too) so it was left to me to keep things bubbling. The saddest moment was when Blake started to consider replacement members for the band: maybe we could get Becca back? Somewhere, Andy was shaking his head in amazement.

  There was no official statement from either the Wonderkids or the record label. Andy had said it himself: he wasn’t one of those “down in the foxhole” managers. He’d told them plainly: “let’s not go there.” Well, we were there and he wasn’t. Blake would have happily fought that Jim Morrison trial, or even the Ulysses trial. He would have willingly been one of the Chicago Eight, trading Wildean one-liners with an irate Judge Hoffman. He would have even loved to be involved in the “is it art or is it pornography?” debate. He would have happily read the court transcripts at gigs like Lenny Bruce, and he would have been a martyr for any one of these causes. None of these options was on offer. And the drug busts were so dull. That’s what he was really facing: a bail violation and two drug busts, one on my behalf, because I was a fool. It was very likely that Blake would go to jail because of me. As we drove across the country, he seemed resigned to this, and when we finally arrived back in California, we found the house on Lookout locked to us, and Randy due out on another job.

  Of course.

  We were homeless.

  Blake, Jack, and I moved into a motel somewhere in Toluca Lake. We had managed to be off the radar for as long as we drove across America, but now we could be found. And we were. And not by any of the people we might have wanted to find us

  These were grim days, in a state that didn’t want us, shortly to fly back East to face two different trials.

  You knew when things were bad with Blake, because he lost his fight; his mantra became “it doesn’t matter.” He couldn’t afford to be caught doing wrong, he was too ashamed to have fun, and without stimulation he dulled. He even stopped jiggling, his leg no longer vibrating like a tuning fork. He wrote lonely songs on a tiny uke in the corner of the room. They didn’t sound like anything I’d ever heard from him before. Maybe they’d be released from his prison cell, like those Charlie Manson albums.

  When you thought about it . . . all he’d done was smoke weed and, being the front man, the wild man, the face of the band, taken the fall. Yet he never asked for our apologies, rarely got our thanks, and took what was coming his way. That’s what a dad does, right?

  And a dad also offers a press release, like one of those family news Christmas cards. He faxed it to the record company from the shabby motel lobby: “The Wonderkids are breaking up because it’s time to sing a new song. With apologies and love from Blake Lear and the Wonderkids. P.S. And, in our absence, don’t forget to grow up! Or grow down! One way or the other! It’s fun either way!!”

  It was a relief to go to trial.

  The lawyer had been in touch with the British Embassy, which dispatched a rather harried Mr. Bean character. There was a lot of waffle about “internationally accepted standards” and “prisoner’s rights,” but on no account could he get a British National out of prison or detention, or assure him special treatment. It seemed certain, however, that Blake would be able to serve whatever sentence he was handed at the British taxpayer’s expense, due to a prison transfer deal that was part of the “special relationship.” This was the best news we’d had in ages: we just wanted to go home.

  After that, nothing seemed very important, and I realized that what I had feared most was simply the fore
ignness of the situation. All we had to do was get him back to England, then it’d be like Porridge or one of those groovy open prisons, something we understood.

  As for the trial itself, I’d been fantasizing along the lines of “Is this all some kind of a joke to you, Mr. Lear?” but this was bureaucracy at its most tedious. Blake was tried in Maryland on all counts and given, coincidentally just like Jim Morrison, a six-month sentence, in this case not suspended, to be served in full. I assume he would have jumped at an offer similar to that which Morrison received—the opportunity to trade it all in for a free concert—but this was never mooted.

  In an interview room afterwards, I asked whether he’d like me to stay somewhere close by until we traveled back to Britain.

  “I’m not on death row,” he said with something approaching a smile. “They’re just holding me here for a couple of days until the transfer.”

  “No, but . . . I can come by whenever you like.”

  “You both go back home. I’ll see you there. I’m sure I’ll be in one of those prisons my dad is always complaining about.”

  “More Butlins than Broadmoor,” Jack quoted.

  “Blake Lear in Folsom Prison?” I suggested.

  “Exactly. I’ll see you there. Dad has the key to my apartment. Look after it for me.”

  “Home.” What was home except a tour bus?

  How was I equipped to deal with that?

  I’d been away nearly two years.

  15

  “Thirty-six dollars for picking flowers and a night in jail. Goddamn. You can’t hardly win, can you?”

  BLAKE WAS “IN TROUBLE” FOR SIX MONTHS. THAT’S WHAT HE CALLED it. There was no chance of parole due to the complicated nature of his transfer. Six months in trouble; six months off.

  I visited at the end of the first week, as soon as I was allowed. Blake and I faced each other across an empty table, as though we were about pit our wits in a game of Racing Demon. It was one of those situations where it’s tough to be natural because you’ve only ever seen it on TV, and you wonder whether that’s how people really behave. I felt like I might have forgotten to learn some lines; it was all a bit of a bad dream. Blake was trying, failing, to be chipper. I desperately wanted to avoid all the dumb jokes we would naturally have made on the subject—the file in the birthday cake, the soap in the shower—but this self-censorship, in which we were both complicit, served only to make the conversation more stilted.

  “Everything okay?” I asked only unavoidable questions.

  “Yeah. Time to think, you know. How’s the old flat?” At his suggestion, I’d moved in. Rent was paid; the gas was on. But I’d forgotten how to sit still, and I was already feeling claustrophobic. “Give it a good spring clean? Time for a new start. Oh and I’m going to ask one favor. It’s this: don’t visit. It’s great to see you, and I can’t wait to get out, but . . . I think that’s best.” He wasn’t looking at me. “Anyway, plenty to do in here. The library’s pretty great, if you don’t want a book written in the last fifty years.”

  “You don’t have to pretend you’re enjoying yourself.”

  “In a funny way, I am. I’m writing new songs. I’m reading. I’m taking a breather.” I caught his eye; even he didn’t believe him. I wanted him to wink, but the wink was gone.

  “Right,” I said. “Better than being a rock star.”

  “Look. This isn’t perfect.” To avoid my gaze, he was reduced to checking out one of my fellow visitors who was in the middle of a hissed argument with her husband. “I’m not happy to be here, but I might as well make what I can of it. And to that end, I think it would be better if you didn’t come.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’ll make the time go slower. And because I don’t want to have to pull a long face even longer than yours. I don’t want sympathy. I don’t want to be reminded of the real world. I just want to get on and get out of here.” He promptly changed the subject. “Some people actually get to work out in the community a bit; come home by curfew.”

  “Bit of a holiday camp, is it?”

  “That’s what Dad would say.”

  “Will he come?”

  “I didn’t have to tell him not to. He’s under the impression that the punishment is mostly his. I told Jack the same as you. It’ll be gone in a flash. I’ll write. Often.”

  I watched my breath mist the window of the little bus that ferried the prison visitors back to the train station.

  “What’s wrong, love?” asked a woman whom I’d seen inside growling at her husband. “Your mate’ll be okay.”

  “He’s my . . .” I was going to say “dad” but it suddenly seemed a ludicrous thing to say. He didn’t look old enough to be my dad; I didn’t look anything like him or behave like his son. I mean, all children finally get to know their parents as real people—don’t they?—but I’d never really had the previous bit with Blake, the absolute trust, the unconditional blind love, despite his countless kindnesses to me, his wish to protect me. He said a few times that I’d missed out on a childhood, but he couldn’t do anything about it despite his best intentions. I mean, not criticizing me for eating sugar wasn’t going to do it. I remembered I was in the middle of a conversation: “Yeah, he’s my mate.”

  “Well, he’ll be fine, love. My Bob’s got three more. Won’t hardly know Sharon. I’d take her in to visit, but I don’t want her to see him like that.” She dismissed the thought with a swat of her hand. “Next week? Same time, same place?”

  “I’m done,” I said. For some reason, she took my hand and squeezed, reminding me of Becca.

  The majority of my knowledge of Normanside Prison, which wasn’t quite as open as I’d imagined, comes from Blake’s letters, rather than that sole visit, for which I was muddled, annoyed, and finally a little teary-eyed, though I didn’t let Blake see.

  At first, the letters were merely descriptive of the daily routine, the lack of privacy, the small acts of kindness. It was easy to read between the lines but clear that Blake was doing his very best not to communicate any negativity about his experience. Anger and resentment were notable by their absence. The letters were controlled, documentarian. They implicitly begged me to adopt the same tone in reply. I wasn’t as good at disguising my own feelings.

  “Why doesn’t he want us to visit?” I asked Jack.

  “Spoils the rhythm,” he replied. Blake had sold him on that story too. I wasn’t buying.

  “How’s Barry taking it?”

  “Doesn’t want to know. Hasn’t told the neighbors. Lucky no one’s heard of the Wonderkids over here. I knew failure would pay off.” Jack laughed. Scandal or no scandal, he wouldn’t need to work for a while (even though the money was mysteriously held up mid-Atlantic). Nor would I. What with my rent-free apartment and Blake’s cashpoint card, it was like I was still on per diems. But I was already antsy. Blake cooped up made me want to keep moving.

  “Bit of bother of my own, actually,” said Jack. “Lucky it’s not muddled up in all this.” He flicked imaginary fluff from his sleeve. “Remember how we really thought we’d arrived when that first paternity suit popped up? Well, we can’t laugh this one away. I haven’t got such a good excuse.”

  “Oh.” I raised my can. “Congratulations? Further icing on the WonderCake?” Maybe it was that woman on the front seat of our tour bus, heels to the ceiling. That was a mental image I could do without. Why is it that all the horrible stuff stays with you and the nice stuff disappears? And why, for that matter, hadn’t Mei-Xing called me back?

  “But the thing is . . . my girlfriend is coming over and I don’t know what to tell her.”

  “I didn’t know you had a girlfriend.” This seemed far more significant than a stray baby.

  “Well I didn’t, and I do, and we’re going to give it a go.”

  “Did I meet her?”

  “You heard about her. Rita.”

  “Oh,” The penny dropped. “Is she the one who . . .?” I put one wrist over the other in an x, palm
s up. He nodded. “Right. Not the . . . not the kid type then? But . . .” I didn’t know quite how to put it. “Sane?”

  “Oh yeah. Sanest woman I ever met.”

  “Then tell her the truth. Jack Lewis, father, boyfriend: what next?”

  “Guitar God would be nice.”

  I wanted to organize something but couldn’t seem to start with myself. I shuffled papers around my desk, jiggling with impatience, fingers itching to get working on a project, an itinerary, a chart. Greg was my one distraction. I always felt at home in his flat, that rundown, dusty museum of rock ’n’ roll of which he was the laziest curator in the world. Barry was in denial, Jack otherwise occupied, but Greg was thoroughly put out by the No Visitors rule.

  “I could help,” he said. “I was in as a lad. I know the drill, the language.”

  “That’s the last thing Blake wants. Says he just wants to learn from it and move on.”

  “But I’ve always wanted to see one of those new prisons.”

  “Well, perhaps it’s time to cool the tourist impulse and consider the needs of the prisoner.”

  “Spoken word,” said Greg. “I sent him a postcard of Strangeways with Wish You Were Here written on it.”

  “Nice,” I said. It’s the most versatile word ever, “nice.” I can inflect it to mean almost anything. In this case it meant: “Not very nice, and not at all considerate.” The whole idea of incarceration made him misty-eyed. He imagined prison a pleasant existence, like working at a record label in the seventies but without the bother of compulsory late night gigs. Life was too many choices; prison would simplify things.

  “He’ll be out in a couple of weeks with good behavior,” was his wistful conclusion.

  “It doesn’t work like that. He stays for the entire time. And then if he ever gets caught with drugs again, he’s in big trouble.”

  “Wanna cuppa?” Greg shuffled into the kitchen, asking over his shoulder: “What do the letters say?”